"I think they shouldn’t close it, because I have all my friends, and it's fun here," third-grader Marcos Wise said.

Ed Wise, the student's father, weighed in as well.

"As long as the students and the faculty are happy here, there’s no problems at this school," he told KCRA 3. "You gotta leave it open."

The district said it expects to save $10 million during the next four years by closing the 11 schools.

The proposed closures come as the school district continues to face declining enrollment and a multi-million dollar budget deficit.

The Sacramento City Unified District School Board will begin discussing the closures at a meeting Thursday night.

"We’re going to look at this as a fiscal issue and look (at) it the best way we can to help the families get through this," said Jeff Cuneo, the board president.

At the start of the 2012-13 school year, there were 56 elementary schools in a district that served 26,000 students.

Meanwhile, the Elk Grove Unified School District has 39 elementary schools for 32,000 enrolled students.

One of the schools recommended for closure, C.P. Huntington Elementary, was built for 600 students, but currently has an enrollment of only 240.

The Sacramento City teachers union said the shuttering of schools is unfortunate, but it supports the decision so that resources from under-utilized schools can be shifted to facilities with higher enrollments.

"The schools can then pay for themselves," said Scott Smith, of the district teachers union. "It takes about 450 students at an elementary school to pay for all of the services and things that a typical elementary school has."

The district added, it expects to see a decline in enrollment over the next few years -- which means less money under California’s per-pupil funding for K-12 education.

A final vote on closures will take place Feb. 21.

Parents told KCRA 3 they were informed of the possible closures by a phone message from the district.

"It just came out of nowhere," said Marilyn Winston, whose son goes to Bret Harte Elementary in Curtis Park. "I am pretty shocked."

Winston was one of several parents who said they were surprised about the number of possible closures, especially after voting for Proposition 30, the tax initiative that promised to help fund education.

"I voted for (Prop 30) -- I thought it was going to be a good outcome. I didn’t think it was going to close 11 schools," Winston said.

But district officials said if Proposition 30 hadn't passed, the cuts would be much worse, and that the schools that are on the list of potential closures were selected for enrollment -- not Prop 30 funding.

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